Nice post and nice work. Impressive that you are analyzing what worked and what didn’t and making a 2nd effort here. I think when we take an honest account of what failed and modify our approach, it will boost our odds significantly.
I quit 1,000 times until I did this last time, my forever quit from alcohol.
being in denial that I was an alcoholic, to myself and others
thinking I could learn to moderate alcohol consumption if I tried hard enough
not telling anyone during start/stops that I quit
not having tools or coping strategies to get through temptation
not having sober friends
What worked:
escaping denial as my friend James (on here) congratulated me for on my day 1 post
realizing there is no such thing as moderation. It’s all a big lie we tell ourselves
telling EVERYONE I know; friends, family, colleagues, even my usual waitstaff at my fav restaurants that I quit drinking VERY shortly after I quit. It kept me accountable.
reading everyone’s post about putting tools in your sobriety tool box and doing that. “Playing the tape forward” “not drinking the only drink that matters (the first),” etc…I didn’t even know what a sobriety toolbox was until this forum. Now I feel like I have dozens of tools that help me daily.
finding real life sober friends and doing stuff with them.
reading this forum every single day for 223 days and making friends here - it’s been amazing.
I couldn’t tell you how many times I tried to quit or for how many years I tried. It was a lot. I have known I had drinking and drug issues for years. I would tackle one addiction and replace it with another…until I figured that out, I was stuck.
What I tried that didn’t work was a lot of moderation and bargaining for a long time.
I would only drink on weekends.
I would drink only vodka, then I changed that to only wine. First only red. Then only white.
I would only drink every other day or only 3 days a week. I would only have two drinks (this rarely happened)
I would try to stop, but my husband and friends were still drinking and it was hard to not feel frustrated and angry with him because he was drinking. How could I quit when my husband drinks almost daily?
I really believed for a long time that if I could ‘get a handle’ on my drinking I would be ‘okay.’ Or if he quit too then I could quit.
I was truly in despair the last six months or so before my quit that stuck. I was very deep in depression and anxiety and I thought often and long about killing myself. I was so sick and tired of living in the relapse and quit cycle.
Through all that time I learned / did a few things…
No amount of bargaining or moderating was going to work. I needed to become alcohol and addiction free.
Whether or not my husband or friends or family drank, it was 100% my responsibility to not drink. My drinking is 100% my responsibility.
Always always always keep quitting. Never give up. If I fell off and drank, I would stop again ASAP.
Reading a lot of sobriety books and memoirs…The Naked Mind provided a good shift in my view of alcohol. I also took a lot of inspiration from Allen Carr’s Easy Way book. He had been really helpful when I quit smoking and nicotine many years ago. A lot of the tips and tricks for quitting smoking obviously translate to drinking…sadly, this took me awhile to internalize and ‘get.’ Educating myself about alcohol and addiction was important.
I ramped up my physical activity to help clear my mind. Lots of bicycling and fitness classes.
I took up yoga and meditation…this helped me relax and helped my anxiety…again, resting and healing my mind.
I was okay with eating a lot of sweets…anything but drinking. Later I had to admit I had replaced alcohol with sugar, so I have acknowledged and worked on that as well.
For the first several months I said no to parties, going out, adventures with friends where alcohol was going to be and anything / place where I felt my sobriety might be at risk.
I had to understand what I was feeding with my addictions. My less than feeling, my need to escape and numb my mind (this is where the yoga and meditation really helped). Self medicating my anxiety and less than feelings. Trying to stop the ongoing negative talk in my head.
I learned that the party really was over and I had stayed about two decades too long. Seriously, it had ceased being any ‘fun’ a long time ago, but I like to chase a high well after it gave up its usefullness as a numbing agent.
I found WFS, Women for Sobriety…as well as Soberistas and I spent a long time on both sites reading other women’s stories and finding so many similarities and educating myself and adding to my knowledge base and sober toolbox.
Read more sober memoirs…these inspired me to keep moving forward with sobriety.
I found the Talking Sober app. And I learned so much on here. Reading all the threads was incredibly helpful. This was a great place to turn to every day to keep me reminded of my path.
From here I learned to not romanticize drinking…to keep my list of what drinking offers and what alcohol free offers. This has been crucial to me…just having that list to remind me of the really bad and dark years.
I feel like my process of getting here was time spent building my sober muscles. It didn’t happen overnight for me, but it DID happen. Every step added to my knowledge base and my ability to reframe my relationship with alcohol and with myself.
Through all these years and especially these last 2+ alcohol free years I learned to value and trust myself again. I found my self esteem again…that was a biggie for me.
Life is a continuous opportunity to learn and grow. It is really nice to be in this phase of life as a sober person and to be able to experience life as a sober person. It is truly a different life altogether and I am very grateful for it.
I cherish waking up sober and regret free every day.
I thought if I went to rehab I would be cured. I didn’t/wouldn’t put in the work to actually stay sober. I was smart so I just thought, naw I got this. All I really got was a couple more trips to rehab. I was a lazy, arrogant prick, and it kept me sick.
Eventually I realized what a dumbass I was and went to AA. This time I was willing to follow suggestions. I realized I couldn’t do it on my own. That I didn’t have any answers. I got a sponsor and started working the steps. It’s been 615 days since I’ve had to put a drink or drug in my body.
I made it 6 months, stoppee going to meetings and got the old “I’m cured, I can drink like a norm” syndrome.
Succeeding this time because I haven’t stopped doing what has worked. I go to meetings, I check in here a lot, I still pray for the obsession to be removed. The gift of desperation was hammered into me, before I was the one who took some initiative in my getting sober and I wore it like a badge of honor, everyone else in my IOP was forced, but not I, I was smarter than your average bear.
So much good wisdom posted already! I have 8 days and on the 3rd, my foggy head cleared and I had a dose of hard truth that I felt was going to utterly break me. Here’s what I realized…
First times on the wagon:
50% honesty with myself. Not fully committed to a life long sobriety out of fear I would “miss out” not being able to have just one cold beer on a beautiful day and allowing myself to rationalize that it would be ok after I got my bad drinking habits under control.
I didn’t actively make plans to live life sober. Stayed in my old patterns.
Not being conscious of being patient and letting the rewards of the accomplishments I was achieving while abstaining “ring my bell” because it takes time to allow my satisfaction meter to be lowered to an easier level.
Giving up without even a fight when life got hard to bear.
What’s been working:
Realizing that I’m too weak to handle my addiction alone and I’m never too strong to reach out for help when I need it. Being aware of my flags and my emotions when I start my old dialogue in my head about having just one or two drinks in the moment. Taking inventory of my past and really bringing truth about why I stopped even though its painful, it helps me put perspective on why I need lifelong sobriety.
Changing old patterns by writing down when my most vulnerable times are during the day and making a list of anything to do but drink during those time frames.
Really allowing myself some grace when I am having a struggle for example: having that soda with my lunch even though I feel guilty about its unhealthy quality because it does make me happy for the moment and its definitely better than catching that buzz that will start my avalanche of destruction all over again. That moment to moment mentality really resonates with me because it’s hard to make that a habit on a daily basis. Being constantly aware is tiring but necessary and it takes time/work. And this time I’m very open and willing to put in that work. I’ve worked to create my bad habits and worked harder to function in life with alcohol so I will work at this difficult task of being sober until it becomes easy.
The answer must always be 100% “no” when it comes to drinking. No making rules (just drink on the weekends, only drink beer, stick to a max 2 drinks, etc) – that’s all bullshit. Don’t waffle. When those wheels start turning, the answer is a hard and forceful no.
I had to stop looking at my not drinking as a restriction, and start looking at it as an opportunity and a blessing – which it is.
Stay active on the forum. Some days I don’t have much to contribute, some days I’m just here messing around with non-sobriety related topics, and that’s fine. But I am here pretty much every day. The sense of community has been useful.
This thread is great. For many years I made those kinds of rules, like only beer no wine, or only drink at parties not home alone, or no more than 100 drinks this year (a New Years resolution I’ve often broken), to try to reduce my drinking. Sometimes the rules worked, or worked for a while, sometimes not at all, but I think what I needed was a change of mindset: to stop thinking of alcohol as the ultimate treat/ comfort/ prop/ necessity, but as something fundamentally harmful to my wellbeing.
I listen with an open heart to what she (and you) say. Thank you!!
